Use quick wits and quicker reflexes to carve your own path through the mysterious ruins of Cloudbuilt, floating high above the ground. Manipulate the laws of physics to avoid fatal hazards, dodge hostile robots and reach not just the end of each level, but the top of the global leaderboards too.

24. april

Thank you everyone for taking part in the Cloudbuilt Level Editor competition! We have had an exhilarating time exploring, speed-running and falling off of the creations submitted over the last month. The level editor has been wonderfully adopted as we had hoped and already Cloudbuilt has many more levels available to play than we could have ever created.

Winners

Without further ado, the first winner of the Mad Catz Tournament Edition R.A.T. and matching mouse mat is Kalifen with his entry "What goes up must come down"! Kalifen's level (linked below) features some eloquent wall running and generous use of Defiance's newly added boosters creating a whirlwind rush of a level. Be warned, intermediate skill is required however we fully recommend giving it a shot!
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=412660429

Coilworks have also chosen their favourite design to be awarded the Mad Catz mouse bundle. Here’s a message from them about their choice pick and some special mentions:

There were a lot of great levels and we had a lot of fun playing through them all. We of course agree with the community that Kalifen made some truly amazing stuff but we would also like to mention a couple of other creators that made some levels that we really found to be extra interesting.

Zanarias probably made the most confusing level of all and it was a true mess to play, but intentionally so. We had a lot of fun struggling our way through it, treating it more like a puzzle than anything else. We even started giving each other tips and sharing solutions while playing to try and conquer it as a team! We found it very interesting but it’s definitely an acquired taste.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=412599043

Once again a big thank you from all of us here at Rising Star Games and Coilworks to the community for supporting the launch of the Cloudbuilt level editor.

Both competition winners will have received a friend request from RSG’s Spoonparty and he will ensure your prizes find you safely.

12. april

We have not written full patch notices for the last two patches, but here comes a full list of all the fixes and changes.

Hope you find them interesting!

Game:

Leader boards for custom levels now implemented

A more robust custom level menu with support for browsing through more than 10 levels

Models skins from defiance now work in the practice level as well

When doing generalization of game input, a small buffer time for jumps and dash input during a dash have been added, leading to inputs not getting eaten if pressed right before the allowed timing.

A bug with the player weapon was fixed, where the player sometimes could not fire a green charge bullet if released right as the weapon reloaded.

Added cloud save feature. If you have a local save file, the game will ask what to do when starting up. (The old and local file will not be removed, it will simply be renamed, so you can still find it)

A bug with the messages in in the result screen were corrected.

The camera now continues to animate when accessing the custom level menu

Some secret edits were made to the games intro level…

Editor:

Added weapon pickup asset that makes it possible to fully customize and build custom weapons and bullets. The pickup can also use different colors to distinguish between weapon types.

Shield barrier and shield gates assets now have the option override the default shield color, enabling them inform players of a potentially modified behavior.

The deprecated Mono Script triggers were removed. You can no longer create them, but levels that were using them previously can still use them, but it’s recommended to change to the normal script triggers.

The script triggers got an easier to use menu to choose script.

Time dilation script were added to allow down to 25% and up to 400% game speed. Notice that it might get more CPU demanding to run the game quicker, so use it with care if there are a lot of things happening in your levels.

New script were added to enable to change music mid level.

Tutorial message script were added, allowing you to write messages to the player, containing tips or general information.

Game modes can now be tested within the level editor, by going to the play settings panel.

A level can now choose what music to use through the level settings panel.

You can now set the number of lives a player should start with through the level settings panel.

More game mode options were added, one of them being the ability to limit the players energy freely.

The player asset got a few fixes, including a fix to the max energy value, and a new option for ghost mode, as well as two new values to tweak the game rules, enabling custom levels to hinder some of the more extreme methods for shortcuts.

Popup menus scroll feature were inversed

The camera free flight mode can now be activated though simply holding down the right mouse button and start dragging the mouse.

Change auto save interval and number of files to save every 5 minutes of editing, and save up to 12 files.

Fixed the old editor HUD bug where some elements got invisible

Added a view drop down button in the asset panel, to reset the camera back to the level origin or focus on the levels directional lights.

Screen shot feature for the publishing menu was fixed to work properly first time it’s used.

Option to generate a new leader board was added to the publishing menu. This will render all old leader boards unusable, and inaccessible, so use with care, but if the level have gone through significant changes that can affect the leaderboard, it’s recommended to generate new ones to keep things fair.

Added a feature to return to the editor in position from game play <Shift-Esc>

Made the render variable window in the level settings panel more manageable.

Hotkeys for changing game speed while running the editor was changed to:

Decrease game speed with <,>

Increase game speed with <.>

Reset game speed with <M>

Added two new larger versions of existing enemies.

Fixed a bug with level block splitting to not create texture seams any more

Fixed some other minor issues causing crashes in some rare situations.

The list is quite long, and there are many changes here. Please let us know if we missed to mention something. It’s easy to forget minor improvements there were made in the fly here and there.

We are also working to finish the last two video tutorials for the level editor.

Anmeldelser

“Cloudbuilt is a gorgeous free-running game with a touching metaphorical dimension.”
8/10 – Eurogamer

“Could easily top game of the year lists… f*ck this brilliant bullsh*t.”
Rock Paper Shotgun

“... primed to be an intensely challenging, beautifully stylised runner/platformer.”
Total Biscuit

Om dette spillet

A young woman, a mysterious world and dark clouds on the horizon... welcome to Cloudbuilt.

Cloudbuilt sees quick wits and even quicker reflexes become your closest friends as you carve your own path through the mysterious floating ruins high above the clouds. A game of speed, precision and freedom, use your rocket-powered exoskeleton and manipulate the laws of physics to avoid fatal hazards, dodge hostile robots and reach not just the finish line of each stage, but the top of the worldwide leaderboards too.

Packed with progressively challenging levels, as well as all manner of shortcuts and secrets to discover, Cloudbuilt’s fast-paced competitive action will push the limits of gamers seeking a challenge time and time again.

Game Features
• Jaw-dropping visuals – A unique and utterly gorgeous cel-shaded art style makes the world of Cloudbuilt come alive like nothing you’ve ever seen.
• Run, jump, fight! – Cloudbuilt combines parkour-style platforming, action-packed gunplay and the fast-paced thrills of racing against the clock to create a hugely addictive and competitive game.
• Blaze a trail – Open level design allows you to reach each goal in all kinds of different ways. Carve your own route through any stage you like, then keep refining it to get the fastest time possible.
• Go your own way – Players can find their own route to the finish not just through each level, but also the game; a branching story across 22 levels offer seven unique worlds and four different endings to discover.
• Fight for supremacy – Finish stages quickly and make your mark on the global leaderboards. Find new shortcuts and use all your skill to climb as high as you can!
• A minute to learn, a lifetime to master – Rather than making players unlock abilities, Cloudbuilt gives you everything you need right from the start. Pick up the basics immediately, then discover skills you never knew you had and put them to good use!

NEW! Use the Level Editor to create your own Cloudbuilt levels, then upload them to Steamworks for everyone to enjoy or download levels made by others! Will you be the one to create the greatest community level around?

(Please note: Use of level-building assets from Defiance DLC pack requires ownership of Defiance DLC. Minimum specs of Cloudbuilt are slightly higher than shown for those wishing to use the Level Editor tools)

Let me preface this review by saying I don't think Cloudbuilt is a bad game. Unfortunately Valve only allows "Recommended" or "Not Recommended" on their review ratings. Admittedly it's better than when they only allowed thumbs up at least. But unfortunately on games I have mixed feelings on I cannot recommend them to my friends or otherwise.

Anyway, Cloudbuilt is an extremely niche game clearly built for an audience and one audience alone; speedrunners. While that focus helped make it carve out a unique character to its gameplay, its sole emphasis on that has harmed it overall for other players of the game. A lot of the levels feel like they absolutely require memorization in order to do fluidly. The controls are kind of poor as well; with more attention they would have been much, much better. Again, despite the paragraphs below complaining about flaws, I don't feel that this is a bad game. When you're not dealing with issues the game is fast-paced, challenging and extremely fun, playing much like you see in the trailer.

Since the controls are my main problem with the game I'll go over these first. The controls do work, but they FEEL clunky. At least part of this is the length of the game to learning curve ratio. The game is only about 2 hours long to the end, and you can beat most of the side missions in 3 hours. Much of that time the player will likely getting used to little nuances with the controls that are not immediately obvious from the tutorial though, like figuring out that you can air control like in a 2004 game where back instantly stops you. Mixed in is some legitimate clunk too. An example: One of the gifs on the community page right now is the triple slide section from one of the more difficult levels. There is a similar section on another level that ends with you hitting a vertical wall, boosting up the top, wallrunning along the side, then up and around again all the way to the exit. The player only gets a limited amount of boost to do maneuvers like that so losing as little momentum and using the minimal amount of energy is the key to success. Unfortunately the input from the jump off the last slide to the wall is extremely unforgiving. Why? There is no slack at all in the controls. If you hit the boost button even a split second before you've made firm contact with the wall, you will instead boost into it, which will result in you smacking into it, flipping around, then sliding off to your death. In the end what you have to do is rely on visual confirmation that you're in the correct pose before you can boost up which is inefficient and waste momentum/energy. This is really the number one issue with the controls. They already have a pretty decent learning curve in proportion to the length of the game, but this one mostly likely everyone will struggle with on and on because it feels very unnatural and unconventional compared to most games. It's funny because the game has 4 or 5 checkboxes under gameplay options for changing the behavior of how wallruns work, but none to deal with this issue. The fact that those options they put in are even needed should be a red flag right there that wallruns should either be fixed or redesigned.

The other big problem with this game is level design. Memorization is required in several places, period. You are not getting past certain parts on your first try. Stuff like running through a bunch of explosions only to find a force field you need to charge shot, going through a long wallrunning section only to find a force field in your face are quite common later on. The number of times I did a wallclimb only to be smacked by an obstacle was rather enormous. Reflexes can't deal with these things and a lot of the times you have to already know what you're going to do before you do it. There's also a particular chaser enemy that has a force field and will blow up in your face, usually knocking you to your death. Just to give you more time pressure when you already don't know where to go, of course. Things like this are okay on paper but when it comes to playing through a level the first time it is incredibly obnoxious and frustrating. Part of the issue is the pink forcefield things can at times be extremely difficult to see in the air.

On the subject of enemies, I'm not really sure they really add much value to the game at all. In my opinion a lot of the fun vanished as more and more enemies were added to the levels. Only the new/bad players will be affected by the homing missile guys, the regular turrets are worthless, the melee shocker guys on the paths and the wide shooting turrets are the only real threats. Those two have a point in being in the others notsomuch. Eventually the stages start to get chock full of them and they get a bit tedious to avoid. And you have to avoid them because you have a lifebar, which is another thing that puzzles me. You have a lifebar and limited lives. You'd think the main purpose of the enemies would be just to knock you off but apparently not. And lives... fail enough and restart the level... I'd generally only get stuck on one spot on most levels so this just makes it if you get stuck too long there you have to redo the whole thing. I don't see why there are lives other than the simply fact that video games have lives and thus this game needs them too. I mean, Super Meat Boy didn't have lives...

Even with these issues the game generally works and is overall quite a fun experience if you're good enough to play it. I'm not usually a terrible fan of celshading but the game does it well enough and the music fits. Again though, it's clearly targeted at speedrunning and speedrunning alone; it took about two hours for a pleb like me to beat the game and a bunch of the side stages if that's all you're interested in. But in the process of beating it I got maybe one B and the rest were Cs or Ds. If you're the kind of person that likes to get S ranks on everything, this game is probably for you. Of course it ain't easy; said Cs were also around rank 500 on the scoreboard for many of my runs. Game is interesting, but it just needed better execution. Looks like the developers aren't going to be making any sweeping changes at this point, so I'm hoping if they make a sequel it addresses the issues I had with the game.

Attempting to learn Cloudbuilt is like scaling the face of a cliff with your bare hands. It offers no assistance, no guidance, and relentlessly beats you down to where the game can begin to feel almost hostile. There’s so much going on within a given level moving so fast and incomprehensibly, that getting your bearings can seem an impossible task in a game designed for a higher class of player. But Cloudbuilt’s most apparent problem is also one that’s almost entirely frontloaded, and once I made it over that wall and could peer over the whole of the game, Cloudbuilt evolved into one of the most endlessly satisfying and expanding games I’ve played in a very long time.

The controls that felt initially clunky began to showcase their ingenuity, inputs feeling natural and smooth as I chained moves together in a blur of animation. I stopped having to even consider which buttons I’d press and when, merging with my character to where her actions became an extension of myself. That’s not to say I no longer slip up, but those mistakes are now fully my own carelessness rather than the fumbling of button presses. And when I do land that perfect run, the feeling is incredible.

Cloudbuilt gives you such a control over your character that the act of pulling an insane jump or sequence of wall runs is that much more of a personal accomplishment. I was never coddled or helped along, which caused the first few hours to be a gauntlet of painful ineptitude, but once I grew past that point every success was entirely the result of my own skills versus the game giving me a helping hand. It’s a distinction that makes even just a basic series of jumps gratifying, each movement feeling intensely connected to my own input. Cloudbuilt is addictive not because of a daily grind or manipulative elements of its design, but purely how amazing it feels to do well at it. I’m not sure I could name another game that has given me such an intoxicating sense of satisfaction, calling me back even after I’ve played through every level because I just can’t get enough.

A lot of that is definitely owed to the wondrously and intentionally exploitable level designs. Though there have been games designed around freerunning before, Cloudbuilt is the first I’ve played that embodies its focus on experimentation and versatility. Levels are designed for the express purpose of speedrunning with a speedrunner’s mindset. Branching paths extend in every direction, directly incorporating the sort of impossible shortcuts and unorthodox approach to levels speedrunning is built upon. I wanted to replay levels because I knew there was always some way through I hadn’t tried; some faster run yet to be discovered, providing with it a glimpse at how enjoyable speedrunning can be without requiring I break the game or even be very good at it.

Everything in Cloudbuilt has such a sense of purpose, of perfect connectedness and intelligence. Your moveset and the levels you use it within compliment and expand upon each other. Small aesthetical touches like the colors of objects and enemies lend a great amount of readability to level designs, converging for the point of ensuring you’re forced to slow down as little as possible. The only thing Cloudbuilt does poorly is teaching you how to read a level and use the tools it gives you. It’s a challenging game to begin with, and requiring players largely figure it out on their own means many will likely give up early on before they arrive at the point of clarity several hours in.

That moment of comprehension never does arrive for the narrative unfortunately, regardless of how long you spend analysing it. Its method of delivery, that being narration after completing a level, is bland and exists in a space that almost begs to be skipped over, written in a style that’s verbose and crudely philosophical. There are themes worth discussing here, like the military’s abuse of its soldiers and the moral implications of experimenting on an comatose patient even if for the purpose of saving them, but they’re overwhelmed by wordy introspection that always seems to circle around and arrive at no conclusion. Perhaps it’s accurate for a character effectively trapped within their own head, but it’s no less difficult to digest and seemingly unconcerned with whether you pay any attention to it or not as it rambles on.

Cloudbuilt is one of the most remarkable games I’ve played in years. It’s also one of the most difficult to appreciate without committing yourself to a great deal of hardships. I wouldn’t be the least surprised if they proved too much for some players, but they’re troubles that exist all but entirely within the first few hours of play, standing as a barrier to an otherwise astoundingly intelligent and enjoyable game. I’ve yet to have a session of Cloudbuilt where I didn’t come away having discovered a new layer to its design or be even more interested in coming back again. Arriving at that point was unquestionably brutal, but having gotten to the other side of Cloudbuilt hurdle of comprehensibility, I’m extremely glad I stuck around to see it.

My my this game. I absolutely adore it! There are a lot of games where the gameplay is fast paced but severely lacks any control. Cloudbuilt however gives you the chance to control it... after you die a lot at first. A lot of reviews say this game is hard at first and, yes, it is but dont let that put you off! So many times Ive messed up on a little jump or a boost and thought: "darn now im not gonna get an A!", but I keep trying and when you get a good score you feel so good about it! I swear this game is a counter to my depression! >w<But in all honesty I could probably play this just for the soundtrack because, oh god is it beautiful!Anyway, when alls said and done, you should probably give this game a try! Even if its not your forte.

I'd like to start out by saying most of the bad reviews for this game seem to be more annoyed that the game requires high levels of precision and speed to succeed in. You are going to fail -- ALOT. You are going to give it all you got into getting the best possible score, and when you think you couldn't have done the level better than you just did, you will rewarded with a measly C-Rank. I went for a long time thinking the highest rank in the game was an A-Rank and was rewarded only to the gods of the boost: Oh, how naive I once was. The clunky controls are described simply by the fact that, yes, you have to boost AFTER you touch the wall or you're going to boost into the wall instead. To the people who complain over the fact that you have to press buttons at the right times or it's not going to work the way you intended, all I have to say is: Git gud.

Really, don't overlook the game simply because someone got frustrated by the un-forgivingness of the game. This is truly a gem of a game you'll be hurting for missing out on. It has amazing scenery and graphics that even had my high-performance PC hiccup at one point. It requires high levels of precision and proper use of your limited boost and firepower all at the same time as jumping precisely from wall to wall at just the right angle as well. It's a very difficult game, harder than Dark Souls, which gets such high levels of praise for being just that. I put this game off for so long because of all the poor reviews I saw for it even though it looked good and I'm sad I had. After finally giving this game a chance I found an unforgettable experience that I come back to time and time again and will always remember as the best and most difficult free-pathed speed-running game I've ever played in my life!

To address another complaint I read; Is this game for everybody? No. But why are you trying to criticize a game for not being for everybody if it clearly advertises itself as a high-precision speed-run game?

One of my favorite games, may even consider ranking it one of my Top-Ten of all time! 5/5

Some people might say that Cloudbuilt is created for a very specific audience, but i don't believe this.

Over and over people, who bought the game, writing post in discussion board saying "Game too hard, make it easy". In less than a week ALL of them confess they actualy made it through. And if you ask them about specific problem that stoped their progress, they say "I already made it. It turned out to be easy." Read the [url]comunity discussion board[/url] if you don't believe me.

So if you expect yourself to complete tihs game within 8 hours (because you usualy do in other games) - you won't. You will complete it after 8.5 hours the next day.

I believe Cloudbuilt is for everyone. The only way to fail in this game is to stop playing.